Race and IQs

[Anomalocaris]

Actually, I was defending myself against CapnAwesome's counterpoint, and put my mouth in motion before putting my brain in gear.  I do however hold to my second point that Huggy is effectively trying to kill the message -- meaning the hypothesis that there are inherent differences -- by shooting the messenger -- the advocates and research of those supporting the hypothesis.  If I had not been kneejerk reacting to CapnAwesome's challenge, that would have been the point I should have made.  That being said, I still hold to that second point.  As a matter of logic, refuting the evidence for A is not evidence for its opposite B.  That is a classic argument from ignorance, and unless B is independently supported, we have no reason to conclude B based upon the refutation of a particular argument or piece of evidence for A.  Tuskegee airmen and the intelligence of African immigrants doesn't do it for me.  If Huggy's contention is that the races are inherently equal in intelligence, I've yet to see good evidence for that.  So the question is, Huggy, are you saying that you believe the inherent intelligence of the races is equal, and if so, what justification do you have for that belief?

*emphasis mine*

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_hypothesis

The null hypothesis and the alternate hypothesis are types of conjectures used in statistical tests, which are formal methods of reaching conclusions or making decisions on the basis of data. The hypotheses are conjectures about a statistical model of the population, which are based on a sample of the population. The tests are core elements of statistical inference, heavily used in the interpretation of scientific experimental data, to separate scientific claims from statistical noise.

"The statement being tested in a test of statistical significance is called the null hypothesis. The test of significance is designed to assess the strength of the evidence against the null hypothesis. Usually, the null hypothesis is a statement of 'no effect' or 'no difference'." It is often symbolized as H0.

The statement that is being tested against the null hypothesis is the alternative hypothesis. Symbols include H1 and Ha.

Statistical significance test: "Very roughly, the procedure for deciding goes like this: Take a random sample from the population. If the sample data are consistent with the null hypothesis, then do not reject the null hypothesis; if the sample data are inconsistent with the null hypothesis, then reject the null hypothesis and conclude that the alternative hypothesis is true."

Do you possess some information that gives you reason to believe there are inherent differences in races intellectually?

The very question you pose after appealing to that ultimate authority called Wikipedia suggests you didn’t understand what the authority said.

[Alexmahone]

 Do you possess some information that gives you reason to believe there are inherent differences in races intellectually?

There's really no reason for populations that have evolved in separate geographical regions and vary in the mean value of several phenotypic traits to have exactly the same mean IQ.

[Anomalocaris]

 Do you possess some information that gives you reason to believe there are inherent differences in races intellectually?

There's really no reason for populations that have evolved in separate geographical regions and vary in the mean value of several phenotypic traits to have exactly the same mean IQ.

There is.

1.  Most of the world’s populations were not really separated.  There are continous gene flows across most large gene pools since the ice age.   The only large population that may have remained generic largely separated from all the others were the native Amerindians.  That separation came to a complete end in 1492.  There is even direct evidence of evolutionarily advantageous genes sweeping across all the major populations in Eurasia in a matter of just a few thousand years to demonstrate the magnitude of gene flow.

2.  There are two reasons why pheontypical traits diverge between populations:  A.  There is strong differences in the suitability of the pheontypical trait to different environments, so that different pheontypical trains are strongly selected for in different populations.  B.  The pheontypical trait is irrelevant to survival of the genes so they can gradually diverge in different population through gene drift with no selection pressure to bring them back together.

Do you deny the fact of substantial gene flow between major populations?

Do you suppose stupidity is selected for in one region where as intelligence is selected for in another?  Or that intelligence doesn’t matter so different group can experience genetic drift that makes some of them more stupid than others without some common selection pressure to correct the decline?

[Alexmahone]

There's really no reason for populations that have evolved in separate geographical regions and vary in the mean value of several phenotypic traits to have exactly the same mean IQ.

There is.

1.  Most of the world’s populations were not really separated.  There are continous gene flows across most large gene pools since the ice age.   The only large population that may have remained generic largely separated from all the others were the native Amerindians.  That separation came to a complete end in 1492.  There is even direct evidence of evolutionarily advantageous genes sweeping across all the major populations in Eurasia in a matter of just a few thousand years to demonstrate the magnitude of gene flow.

2.  There are two reasons why pheontypical traits diverge between populations:  A.  There is strong differences in the suitability of the pheontypical trait to different environments, so that different pheontypical trains are strongly selected for in different populations.  B.  The pheontypical trait is irrelevant to survival of the genes so they can gradually diverge in different population through gene drift with no selection pressure to bring them back together.

Do you deny the fact of substantial gene flow between major populations?

Do you suppose stupidity is selected for in one region where as intelligence is selected for in another?  Or that intelligence doesn’t matter so different group can experience genetic drift that makes some of them more stupid than others without some common selection pressure to correct the decline?

East Asians and Whites have higher mean IQs than South Asians and Blacks because they evolved in much colder environments. Colder environments tend to be more cognitively demanding because one has to make needles/thread for clothing and find a way to preserve food as hunting animals everyday may not be possible.

[Anomalocaris]

There is.

1.  Most of the world’s populations were not really separated.  There are continous gene flows across most large gene pools since the ice age.   The only large population that may have remained generic largely separated from all the others were the native Amerindians.  That separation came to a complete end in 1492.  There is even direct evidence of evolutionarily advantageous genes sweeping across all the major populations in Eurasia in a matter of just a few thousand years to demonstrate the magnitude of gene flow.

2.  There are two reasons why pheontypical traits diverge between populations:  A.  There is strong differences in the suitability of the pheontypical trait to different environments, so that different pheontypical trains are strongly selected for in different populations.  B.  The pheontypical trait is irrelevant to survival of the genes so they can gradually diverge in different population through gene drift with no selection pressure to bring them back together.

Do you deny the fact of substantial gene flow between major populations?

Do you suppose stupidity is selected for in one region where as intelligence is selected for in another?  Or that intelligence doesn’t matter so different group can experience genetic drift that makes some of them more stupid than others without some common selection pressure to correct the decline?

East Asians and Whites have higher mean IQs than South Asians and Blacks because they evolved in much colder environments. Colder environments tend to be more cognitively demanding because one has to make needles/thread for clothing and find a way to preserve food as hunting animals everyday may not be possible.

Really?

I assert the need to hunt or work the agriculture in the blazing heat without succumbing to heat stroke demand more from foresight and planning, and hence intelligence.

Notice modern Homo sapiens didn’t arise from ancesteral homo population in the cold northern latitudes but those in the hot sub Sahara Africa.

[ohreally]

If you could humor me or if you're bored.    So can I summarize what you said as the following:

Null Hypothesis A= "There is no god"  They do a test to find a god and don't find anything so the null hypothesis is not disproved yet there could still be a god.

Null Hypothesis B = "There is a god"  (so what test do we do here?  Exactly the same as A?) we don't find a god and disprove the null.

My thinking was that in either scenario above I'll never have evidence that there is no god, I'll just continually have no evidence there is one.  And I'll never have evidence there is no relationship between IQ and race, I'll just continually have no evidence there is one.

No hypothesis A doesn’t require you to provide proof that there is no god.

It is the devil’s advocate argument against the following proposition:

Proposition:  There is a god and here are the evidence of the said god.

Null hypothesis: there is really no god and such evidence as you’ve presented could still be there anyway.


Conceptually For proposition A to prevail it must show the probability that the evidence being presented for god does not have a reasonable probability of existing if there were no god, for some consistent and a priori defined threshold of reasonableness.

for proposition A to fail all that needs to be shown is such evidence as presented for existence of god could have a reasonable probability of existing anyway even without god, for some consistent and a priori defined threshold of reasonableness.

You can certainly have reasonable evidence that there is no relationship between race and intelligence.  For example if the average intelligence of any randomly selected sample of people from different races always show difference in intelligence of less than magnitude of statistical uncertainty.

Thanks for indulging me.  Ok to make an analogy, using something else that some people believe to be true:   The evidence for no relationship between the location of stars when your are born and personality is that the average personality of any randomly selected person from different astrological signs always shows difference in personality of less than magnitude of statistical uncertainty.      

But normally don't we just say there is no evidence for astrology.  Or no evidence that stars locations when you are born impact your personality.    So if someone said well what makes you think that stars and personality aren't related, what's your evidence?  I would think I don't have any evidence, but technically I should say let me present you with my evidence of (see my above analogy). 

Just like I would say there is no evidence that race impacts your IQ, in a non technical way but I could say in a more technical way that my evidence is that (your last sentence above that i've quoted).

[FatAndFaithless]

Thanks for indulging me.  Ok to make an analogy, using something else that some people believe to be true:   The evidence for no relationship between the location of stars when your are born and personality is that the average personality of any randomly selected person from different astrological signs always shows difference in personality of less than magnitude of statistical uncertainty.      

But normally don't we just say there is no evidence for astrology.  Or no evidence that stars locations when you are born impact your personality.    So if someone said well what makes you think that stars and personality aren't related, what's your evidence?  I would think I don't have any evidence, but technically I should say let me present you with my evidence of (see my above analogy). 

Just like I would say there is no evidence that race impacts your IQ, in a non technical way but I could say in a more technical way that my evidence is that (your last sentence above that i've quoted).

Just touching on the astrology example (i'm not familiar enough with race/IQ research to make any statement), you're right.  Colloquially we'll just say "there's no evidence that the stars affect your personality."  If someone asks you "why do you believe the stars don't affect our personality?", you could alternatively say that there isn't enough evidence to overturn the null hypothesis...but that might not fit well in casual conversation.  You could also say that all of the available evidence regarding the position of the stars and peoples' personalities does not indicate any causal (or even correlative, in this case) relationship.

[polymath257]

Who wrote the IQ tests? What was the knowledge assumed to be standard? Is the lack of effective educational services in Africa relevant to performance on the tests?

It is incredibly difficult to make an IQ test that is culturally neutral.

[Huggy Bear]

The very question you pose after appealing to that ultimate authority called Wikipedia suggests you didn’t understand what the authority said.

Say we're fliping a coin and determining how often it lands on heads or tails, the null hypothesis would be that the coin would have an equal chance of landing on heads as it would tails.

If your claim is that there are factors that would cause the coin to favor one side over the other, then what are the factors?

My question was basically asking what causes one to think that race plays a factor in determining IQ? Where is something tangible we can point at and say, ah ha, this race, has or lacks X that determines the level of intelligence?

[Silver]

If a particular race has an overall lower I.Q. according to statistics, I would personally think genetics were a major contributing factor. Which is not to state that some people within that race are not genetically blessed to have higher I.Q.s.